From dialogue assistants to intelligent execution, how will AI Agents break through in the next step?

Original Title: AI Agent Trends: Beyond AI Slop Bots

Written by: 0xJeff

Compiled by: Asher

As global economic uncertainty intensifies and market sentiment remains low, Web3 AI continues to be one of the most reflexive growth sectors.

The rapid advancement of AI innovation (such as the strategies of tech giants like OpenAI, Anthropic, DeepSeek, Nvidia, Alibaba, etc.) has kept it in the spotlight.

Currently, the total market value of the AI sector has risen to $6 billion after falling to a low of $4 billion in March. Despite the overall market environment being under pressure, some teams continue to explore AI agent scenarios suitable for the crypto ecosystem. From the early proliferation of conversational AI assistants to today's solutions that focus more on solving practical problems, some new trends have emerged:

• Sports Analysis and Automated Betting: The AI Agent analyzes event data in real-time and autonomously makes betting decisions;
• Trading Assistance and Execution: The intelligent auxiliary AI Agent can analyze market trends and execute complex trades;
• DeFi Yield Optimization: The agent system can adjust stablecoin lending strategies in real-time to optimize yield.

The transformation of DeFAI: from abstract layer to "Alpha discovery layer"

Earlier this year, a hot trend in DeFAI was to build ChatGPT-style interfaces that serve as a layer for users to interact with DeFi protocols. However, practice has shown that simply providing a conversational interface does not lead to a good user experience. The problem is that most teams don't invest enough in the "inference layer" (understanding user intent) and the "execution layer" (optimizing the execution path), resulting in AIAgent still relying on users' additional judgment when providing strategy recommendations. For example, instead of using AIAgent to choose the optimal transaction path, it is better to use mature tools such as Defillama Aggregator, Across, or Pendle.

Therefore, many projects are transitioning to the "Alpha Discovery Layer", which helps users discover the most valuable information in the market. In a market environment where information is scarce, finding the best "gold mining point" is key. For example:

• On-chain data analysis: Track smart wallets, fund flows, and obtain leading signals;
• Social media platform information mining: Analyze popular topics on X, Telegram, and Discord to capture trends;
• High-end risk management: such as GigabrainGG, providing institutional-level trading signals.

At present, it has not yet been determined whether existing AIAgents can reliably provide excess Alpha, but some early results have begun to show value.

Multimodal / Multi-channel AI Agent

The traditional ChatGPT style of interaction is not suitable for all scenarios, and Web3 AIAgent is exploring new ways of interaction to integrate more naturally into users' daily workflows.

• Direct interaction on X platform: Cryptocurrency communities are mainly active on the X platform, therefore, agents like Clanker and Bankr are providing services directly through the X platform, simplifying the user operation path;
• Discord Voice Command: AgentTank allows users to directly control AI to execute on-chain tasks via voice in Discord, enabling more efficient collaboration.
• Web3 Browsing and Execution: As many cryptocurrency websites do not provide APIs, a Computer Use Agent can simulate human operations, automatically navigate between different websites, scrape data, and execute trades.

This type of multimodal/multi-channel AI Agent is redefining the user experience of Web3, making AI a true part of the trading and research process.

Virtuals: The Core Platform of the AI Agent Ecosystem

Virtuals' AI Agent tokenization platform has been running for 6 months. Although the overall ecosystem market value has decreased due to market fluctuations, the number of agents has grown from 50 to 716, still making it the leader in the AIAgent field. Currently, the most active application scenarios on Virtuals include:

• GambleFAI: Like Billy Bets, it performs exceptionally well in the AI gambling market, even ranking in the top eight of the ProphetX prediction competition, with an ROI as high as 30%;
• Sports Analysis: Like HeyTracyAI, providing AI-driven analysis and commentary for NBA events;
• Robots and Embodied AI: SAM promotes the development of Embodied AI, aiming to build a decentralized AI computing ecosystem similar to Bittensor;
• Alpha discovered: Platforms like aixbt and Acolyt focus on on-chain data analysis and trading signal provision.

Virtuals is still developing the Agent Commerce Protocol (ACP), aimed at enabling AI agents to collaborate in creating a more efficient economic system. The earliest two application scenarios may be agent hedge funds and agent media centers.

Bittensor as AI infrastructure

Bittensor, with its token Tao, is experiencing a new wave of demand growth. Previously, many users only used TAO for staking on the Root Network, but now more people are willing to invest TAO into tokens of specific subnets to support particular AI applications.

• The dTAO model launched in February: The TAO inflation distribution is determined by the market rather than by the weight of validators. This means that high-value subnets recognized by the market will receive more TAO incentives;
• Actual application growth: Subnets like SN6, 41, 44 are supporting consumer-level AIAgent, such as Billy Bets, DKING, expanding the practical application scenarios of Bittensor.

ElizaOS V2 version and new Launchpad platform Autofun

ElizaOS has always been one of the most popular AI agent development frameworks, and its V2 version is set to be released soon. Meanwhile, the new Launchpad platform Autofun will be launched in two weeks, with 15 projects already prepared to join the ecosystem.

• ElizaOS Status: Currently has 15.3k GitHub Stars, 5k Forks, and its market influence is continuously expanding;
• Funding management issues of AIAgent: Sentient recently published a study revealing security vulnerabilities in funding management of AIAgents such as ElizaOS, highlighting the need for stronger security measures in this field.

Despite the challenges, the ecosystem of ElizaOS is growing rapidly, and its decentralized GPU hosting solution, Comput3AI, will also debut on the Autofun platform.

Summary

The AI Agent is still one of the most promising tracks in Web3. It not only brings together innovations in AI and cryptocurrency but may also reshape the productivity and working methods of the entire industry. From AI trading assistants to cross-chain information capture, from yield optimization to automated execution, AI is bringing a new paradigm to Web3.

Everything is like the internet wave of the 1990s, but on a larger scale and with deeper impact. For early participants, now is the best time to enter.